Dec 27, 2021 · 23m · top-founders
$70m Raised with just $10k in MRR? Can this Devops for SalesOps tool Grow Into Lofty Valuation?
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
Nathan Latka interviews serial tech entrepreneur Benny Schneider to examine how Salto raised $70 million in venture capital to apply developer DevOps workflows and 'Company as Code' infrastructure to corporate business operations tools like Salesforce and NetSuite.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Nathan holds 36.2% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
Nathan as informed peer 4.5 Guest teaching 4.2 Guest disagreement 2.7 Nathan pushing back 4.0
speaking balance: gold is Nathan, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 8:52 Refusing to reveal revenue figures
Benny explicitly shuts down Latka's attempt to pinpoint MRR, stating he will not share specific figures.
Hardest push from Nathan ▶ 9:43 Dismantling Copado comparisonLatka forcefully challenges Benny's market comparable by sharing privileged ARR and valuation metrics from Copado's CEO.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 19:10 Config vs data synchronization breakdownBenny clarifies a technical distinction after Latka compares Salto to Zapier, explaining how configuration management differs from data movement.
Nathan holds their own ▶ 10:14 Detailed round-by-round capital breakdownLatka lists exact funding history and milestones of competitors to challenge Salto's pre-revenue fundraising premise.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | Nathan as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | Nathan pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Introducing Serial Entrepreneur Benny Schneider and Salto | 3 | 4 | 2 | 2 | Latka introduces Benny Schneider and sets up the product background. Benny corrects Latka's assumption that Salto is only for Salesforce, explaining their generic multi-SaaS architecture. | |
| Pricing Structure and Early Commercial Traction | 4 | 3 | 3 | 4 | Latka probes Benny on customer metrics and early MRR, attempting to deduce numbers around $10k-$20k MRR. Benny deflects naming specific numbers while acknowledging that revenue is still low. | |
| Market Comparables and Account Expansion Drivers | 8 | 4 | 4 | 8 | Latka challenges Benny's use of Copado as a comparable by citing detailed financial and funding metrics from Copado's CEO. Benny defends the comparison based on earlier valuation stages. | |
| Sponsor Message: Streamlining Customer Onboarding with Flatfile | 5 | 5 | 3 | 6 | Includes a mid-roll ad read followed by Latka challenging Benny on whether raising $70M pre-revenue restricts exit optionality. Benny reframes success as binary rather than cap table-driven. | |
| Configuration Synchronization vs. Data Integration Pipelines | 5 | 6 | 3 | 3 | Latka attempts to classify Salto as comparable to Zapier or MuleSoft. Benny educates Latka on the fundamental technical difference between moving data and synchronizing system configuration. | |
| Team Composition and Israel's Tech Ecosystem Evolution | 2 | 3 | 1 | 1 | Friendly discussion on Israel's tech funding maturation and standard rapid-fire questions to wrap up the interview. |
Statements from this episode (11)
Schneider: Business operations tooling lags decades behind modern software engineering
“If you think about the methodology being used by the developer, they are like, fifth generation of, ah, you know, technology. When you look at the technology used to develop the other tools, the business operation tools, they are like two G.”
Schneider: Enterprise customers utilize thousands of distinct business SaaS tools
“In reality, people will always talk to you about two, three, maybe four, one for CRM, one for finance, one for marketing, and maybe one for HR. But when we go and talk to customer, they have thousands of tools.”
Schneider: Salto has about 10 paying customers
“We are working with tens of customers and we have already about 10 paying customers.”
Schneider: Salto raised about $70M across three funding rounds
“We raised all together, like you said, 70, about seventy million dollars in three rounds.”
Schneider: Most Salto VCs previously backed his earlier companies
“We use Most of the VCs that we use in the past. So, you know, with some of the VCs, it's like the third time. Some of them, it's the second time.”
Latka: Copado passed $52M run rate and raised at $1.1B valuation
“I mean, I had him on four months ago and they were, or six months ago, they were doing forty million in ARR. He just emailed me and said I could share it publicly that they passed a fifty two million dollar run rate and raised at the 1.1 billion valuation.”
Latka: Copado reached nearly $6M run rate by its 2020 round
“Their first round was a nine million dollar round in 2018, and then when they raised in 2020, which they raised a twenty six million dollar round for, They already passed a five million run rate at that point, almost a six million dollar run rate.”
Schneider: Startup success is binary, so ignore cap table dilution
“I always say that success is binary. Don't worry about how much is left. Make sure that you are successful first, and then everything will be will fall into the right place.”
Schneider: Salesforce is an investor in Salto
“Salesforce is one of our investors and they are definitely helping us within the ecosystem.”
Schneider: Salto syncs SaaS configurations, whereas Zapier just moves data
“If you think about Zapier that you just mentioned, they are connecting more the data at Move. We are connecting the configuration of all those tools, and we are synchronizing the configuration. So if you think about this, there are three parts here. There is t…”
Schneider: Late-Stage Funds Enable Israeli Startups to Avoid Early Exits
“Finally, the late stage funds have discovered Israel. So we see, we call them crossover fund, but it's really late stage that are allowing Israeli companies to run all the way and not sell themselves too early to American corporations. Like we did, let's say f…”